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Harvey Milk, left, shakes hands with presidential candidate Jimmy Carter in this 1976 photo. Today is the 37th anniversary of Milk announcing his candidacy for San Francisco Supervisor. When Milk won the election, he became California’s first openly gay elected official. Photo: Harvey Milk Foundation.

LONG BEACH – Harvey Milk gave Jackie Grover hope.

The 70-year-old Bixby Knolls resident, who used to live in San Francisco, met the social justice organizer in 1976 in his Castro neighborhood camera shop. Decades before a California law protected LGBT employees from discrimination and gay marriage was legal, Milk was advocating equality.

Today is the 37th anniversary of Milk declaring his candidacy for board of supervisors. Milk won that 1977 race and became California’s first openly gay elected official.

During their various camera shop conversations, Milk always encouraged Grover to come out of the closet about being a lesbian, be true to herself, and take more risks.

Grover took Milk’s advice, and, in 1980, moved to Hemet. She worked for 23 years behind-the-scenes, including volunteering on a Riverside County suicide prevention hotline for the LGBT community and creating a gay-straight alliance student club at West Valley High School.

“Harvey wanted to make coming out a pass-the-butter type issue. It wasn’t a big deal,” said Grover, who moved to Long Beach in 2003. “He said you have to be consistent about the way you think, the way you act and the way you talk. You don’t have to be a phoney.

“Unfortunately, most of us have that hoisted on us – If you’re going to fit in, you better not show you are really gay or lesbian,” Grover said. “But Harvey encouraged me to speak out about being a lesbian.”

On the board of supervisors, Milk represented the Haight-Ashbury and upper Market Street neighborhoods, where the city’s gay population emerged as a political force.

While gay rights and fighting against LGBT discrimination were always a priority for Milk, his agenda also included affordable housing, public transportation and expanded child care.

On Nov. 27, 1978 – just 11 months into his supervisor term – Milk and San Francisco Mayor George Moscone were fatally shot by Dan White, another city supervisor. Milk was 48 years old.

“I don’t see him as fighter for gay rights, I see him as a champion for people. A champion of pride in ourselves with right to demand recognition and equality under the law for all people,” he said.

‘COMING OUT OF THE FEAR’

Grover isn’t the only Long Beach person who was influenced by Milk. Elena Larssen, 37, the senior minister at First Congregational Church in downtown, used to live in the Bay Area and is familiar with the slain civil rights leader.

Earlier this year, the church council – the equivalent of a board of directors – took the advice of a congregation member, and passed a resolution saying Milk’s birthday would be honored. About 43 percent of the church’s congregation identify as LGBT, Larssen said.

A short time later, Larssen asked Tina Datsko de Sánchez, the church’s poet in residence, to write a tribute piece on Milk in conjunction with his May 22 birthday.

The poem, “Coming Out of the Fear,” was read during the church’s May 18 Sunday service, the same weekend as Long Beach Gay and Lesbian Pride festival and parade.

“Harvey Milk had a visionary sense that people had to come out, let themselves be know,” Datsko de Sánchez said. “That coming out of the fear has an effect for other people and society to be released from their fear, thinking that LGBT people are in someway other or different than the rest of us.”

The church will present the poem again, but hasn’t decided when, Larssen said.

Nevertheless, Larssen said “Coming Out of Fear” dignified Milk’s struggle for equality.

“It shows honor and respect for the struggle he went through and that LGBT people are going through,” she said. “Activists often live through difficutl struggles and don’t get to see the fruits of their efforts. There’s no paycheck for that, and they often pay a high personal cost.

“It’s important,” Larssen said, “for a church and congregation to say, The work you did was important.”